March BCOTM Sweet 16!

I keep feeling overwhelmed when these numbers are so high, but they just keep climbing.  This is another record-breaking round.  This month’s first round had 1,642, which is nearly 200 more than last month’s first round.

Let’s go over some numbers:

 

The Closest Contest:

Night Lights by Helen Harper beat Holding Their Own XIII Renegade by Joe Nobody only had a three vote difference.  Lights won the day. That match was a 52-48 percent split.  So was The Door Keeper by Steen Jones vs God of the Sun by Kimberly Loth. Keeper took that match.

The Largest Victor:
Hello Isaac Marion and his hoard of loyal voters! My goodness, his book The Burning World, beat The Front  by David Moody to the tune of 93 votes and 85 percent of the match.  Get this….HIS match wasn’t the most voted on contest!

Most Voted On Contest:
When matches are getting up there, it’s hard to notice how close they ar.  To Brave the End by Frank Dorrian vs Fade by Daniel Humphreys was only decided by 15 votes, but it had 155 votes total!

Least Voted On Contest:
I’m a little sad.  Most votes had more than 80.  Heck, a lot had more than 90 votes, so I’m sad that Betrayal by Dirk van den Boom vs Arkwright by Allen Steele only received 64 votes. If you could please ask your supporters to vote in each match, that will only increase the level of competition.  Let’s try to support each match.

Most Votes:
Marion is off to an amazing start. I’m pretty sure he broke the record for more first-round votes. He took 112 votes all by himself.  Perspective: All of December’s bracket only had a TOTAL of 144 votes. So Marion has staked his claim. Is anyone ready to take him on?

So now it’s on to the Sweet 16!  This round will last until April 15. That’s 7 days to pick which 8 will move on.

Head over here and vote!

Thanks for reading,

Matt

February

The March Book Cover of the Month Bracket Begins!

The dawn of a new month has become a bit of a present for me. It means I get to kick off a new bracket.  If you’re curios or new, check out the Book Covers for December, January, and February. 

I’m happy to say February was pretty darn successful. It only came a few hundred away from breaking a record! This month has 31 outstanding new covers and Age of Myth has another chance to seize the day! I’ve been tracking this set of books for a while, and I honestly think it’s the strongest so far. Look, I know I might say that every month, but isn’t that the point?

If you know the authors or the artists, please share this and tag them. I try to tag or friend every author I can, but sometimes it’s hard to track someone down. Max participation is a huge deal to me. The more people who vote, the more recognition these authors and artists receive, and I want this to be as legitimate as possible.

If you are the author, I feel the need to establish a few guidelines.  1) Please feel free to message or contact me at any time. 2) Please feel free to like, share, text, ask for support, and call everyone you know. I absolutely want max participation. However, if you’re going to offer giveaways or prizes, please offer them for voting, not just voting for you. I want your cover to win because it was the best, not because you had the most stuff to give away. When we get to the Final Four, I have a plan or two myself in that regard. Don’t take this to mean you can’t ask for support.

Even if this becomes nothing more than a popularity contest, that’s fine. Why not celebrate with your following? Why not be proud of the platform you have and the number of people who support you? But my biggest goal is to honestly reward the best cover. It’s about the artists. I see TONS of support for authors, and what I want is an honest way to give cover artists/designers credit. The only way that’s possible is to get as many people to vote as we can. Your fans will (and should) vote for you. Your opponent’s fans will vote for your opponent. But it’s when we get to their friends and their friends of friends that impartial voters can help the separate the field. This will ensure the winning cover was decided by the people.

Also, while your summoning your army of voting soldiers, please make sure you ask them to vote in every match. Part of the idea of this is to get exposure to as many artists and authors as possible. By all means, if you can get 1,000 people to vote for your book, do it. Just please also send some eyeballs to the other matches.

A final note to authors and artists: I currently have links to the books’ Amazon pages. If you’d prefer I switch that link to sign up for your newsletter or like your social media page or whatever, just send me the link and let me know. I want this to help you. I want this to be as helpful as possible, so whatever you need me to do to facilitate that, just let me know.

Round 1 will go from today to April 8.

The Sweet 16 will run from then to the 15th.

The Elite 8 will take it from there until the 18th.

The Final 4 runs from the 18th to the 20th.

The Finals will go from the 20th to the 22nd.

I hope you keep having fun. Please, vote, share, and discuss as much as possible.

All you have to do now is head over here to vote!

Thanks for reading,

Matt